Among the three, the DFC model is likely to be junked. FIA is also opposed to another plan to auction international airline entitlements.

Among the three, the DFC model is likely to be junked. FIA is also opposed to another plan to auction international airline entitlements.

NEW DELHI: The Tatas and Wadias — two friends and allies for many decades — are now facing off at opposing lobbies as the civil aviation ministry considers dismantling the ‘five years and 20 aircraft’ (5/20) norm for domestic carriers to fly international.

Nusli Wadia and Jeh Wadia, promoters of GoAir, were part of a delegation that met Minister of State for Civil Aviation Mahesh Sharma on Tuesday as part of a Federation of Indian Airlines (FIA) team. SpiceJet Chairman Ajay Singh was also a part of the delegation. Sources in the know told ET that Wadias argued before the minister that most nations protect and give their domestic airlines priority over foreign carriers.

“This is a new government and there are expectations from it,” Nusli Wadia is learnt to have told the minister.

Existing guidelines allow only airlines that have been flying within India for five years or have more than 20 aircraft to fly on international routes.

Two Tata Group-promoted airline companies — Vistara and AirAsia India — will gain if the rule is scrapped. Incumbents such as Nusli Wadia-owned GoAir, IndiGo and SpiceJet will benefit if it stays. Wadias and Tatas are traditional allies. Nusli Wadia is on the board of Tata Steel. Decades ago, JRD Tata, then chairman of Tata Group, had stepped in on behalf of Nusli Wadia when his father Neville Wadia decided to sell the flagship Bombay Dyeing to the RPG Group.

But on this burning issue in aviation, they are in opposite camps. An email and SMS sent to GoAir Managing Director Jeh Wadia and FIA did not elicit any response.

A recent report prepared by the Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation (CAPA) for Vistara had advocated complete abolition of the international flying eligibility norm.

“Change is not always easy or equitable in the short term and it is understandable that those affected will resist. But maintaining a regulation simply because the incumbents were subject to it is a protectionist logic which will forever consign the industry to negative regulation and has no place in a modern, competitive industry,” the report by CAPA read.

The draft civil aviation policy proposes three options to replace the existing 5/20 norm: complete abolition of the rule, continuation of the norm, and replacing it with a Domestic Flying Credit (DFC) system.

Among the three, the DFC model is likely to be junked. FIA is also opposed to another plan to auction international airline entitlements. It argued that foreign carriers already have a large presence in the country and auctioning foreign flight quotas will strengthen their position here.

“We have been asked to get data on flights by foreign carriers in the country. This will be discussed in another meeting that we are soon going to have with the government,” said another source, who did not want to be identified.

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